Volokh v. James

Summary

Social media sites face many choices when they set rules for users. How much speech is permissible? Will conversations be “anything goes” or strictly moderated for relevance and decorum? Will moderation decisions be automated, human, or a mix? Different sites have made different choices, and that’s as it should be. Indeed, the First Amendment requires that sites have the freedom to make these decisions for themselves. Although social media may be a relatively new medium, long‐​established First Amendment principles give sites the right to control what content they host, just as newspapers and book publishers have a right to select the editorials and manuscripts they print.

Creators/Authors

Josh Zuckerman
Associate Attorney, Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher

Brian McCarty
Associate Attorney, Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher

Anastasia P. Boden
Director, Robert A. Levy Center for Constitutional Studies

Thomas A. Berry
Research Fellow, Robert A. Levy Center for Constitutional Studies, Cato Institute; Managing Editor, Cato Supreme Court Review